Git might replace Mercurial for Java’s source-code management

Developers participating in the evolution of standard Java may soon have a new source-code management system for the project, with the community set to investigate alternatives—including Git—to the current Mercurial repository scheme.

The effort, dubbed Project Skara, is intended to help contributors to OpenJDK, including seasoned committers and relative newcomers, be more productive. Under Skara, alternative source control management and code review management options would be explored, with Git an option.

Git, created by Linux founder Linus Torvalds, already anchors the popular code-sharing site GitHub, which has become an informal standard for collaborating on open source projects.

Project Skara would provide prototypes for hosting Java Development Kit (JDK) 12, which is due in March 2019, following the September 2018 planned release of JDK 11. If prototypes reveal that a different code system arrangement offers substantial improvements over the current arrangement, Skara will shepherd a Java enhancement proposal to make a change.

Project Skara’s evaluation criteria include:

Performance, including time for cloning operations from master repos and time of local operations.

Space efficiency.

Usability in different geographies.

Support for common development environments including Linux, MacOS and Windows.

A capability to host the entire history of the JDK and its project growth over the next decade.

Support for general JDK code review practices.

Programmatic APIs for process assistance and automation of review and processes.